The working platform shown above is used directly at a berth in a Baltic Sea port. Of course, this special location does not come without a few challenges: Without special protective measures, the salty sea air quickly leads to the formation of rust on metallic surfaces, so the top priority here was Provide protection against corrosion.
What is the aerial work platform used for?
As soon as a container ship, a cruise ship or even a ferry docks at the port, various tasks have to be completed so that the journey can continue. Apart from the obvious unloading of the cargo or disembarkation of the passengers, some work also needs to be done in the background. In many ports, for example, the use of shore power in the port is now mandatory. Fuel stocks also need to be replenished.
With the current dimensions of ships, these processes cannot be carried out by using a small hose line, but hoses in the decimetre range are used. To make work as easy as possible for workers at the port, our customer decided to purchase two aerial work platforms.
The employees can now pick up the hoses at the bottom landing and move them to the corresponding connection point of the ship without having to climb a scaffold or ladder.
How is corrosion protection ensured?
As already described at the beginning, the most important thing is to protect the metallic surfaces from the salty sea air. Whenever possible, hot-dip galvanised surface protection was therefore chosen; this offers effective protection against rust even in the aggressive marine environment.
However, a scissor lift table also has a lot of components that cannot be hot-dip galvanised. For example the hydraulic cylinders, or also the non-locating bearing rollers. To ensure the longest possible service life, stainless steel was used as a material .
Now the metal components are protected, what about the electrical system? Of course, electrical components may not be directly exposed to sea air, especially printed circuit boards or contacts are sensitive and corrosion would quickly cause the components to fail. It is therefore important to ensure that the components have a sufficiently high protection class for the entire electrical system.
What about the safety of port workers?
Although corrosion protection plays a special role here, the safety of the port workers must not be forgotten. Just like with our other lift tables , we take safety factors into account in the mechanical design that go beyond the standard requirements. In addition, our aerial work platforms do not merely have pipe rupture safety valves on the cylinder, but electric shut-off valves. If you want to learn more about the different safety levels of these valves, we recommend the following article: Safety through hydraulic valves.
In addition to these normal safety measures, the aerial work platform also has an uninterruptible power supply due to the available effective stroke. This means that in the event of a power failure, a backup battery enables the platform to reach the bottom landing.
Even if the operator becomes unconscious, provision has been made for this eventuality. A second employee can initiate the emergency lowering from the bottom landing . This makes it possible to get the lift back to the bottom end position to attend to the unconscious person as quickly as possible.
